


know that i am with you (the only way that i can be)

by thatiranianphantom (FrraFee)



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV), Wynonna Earp (TV)
Genre: ....kayso, But she's pretending everything's cool, F/F, F/M, GODDAMN IT I WILL DO IT, HEAR THAT EA?, IF NOBODY ELSE WILL WRITE ABOUT WYNONNA I WILL DO IT, THE TRUST BETWEEN US IS GONE, UNTIL MY BBGIRL GETS THE HAPPINESS SHE SO DESERVES, We return to regularly scheduled WE programming, ahem, in which Wynonna is a very sad panda
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-19
Updated: 2019-03-31
Packaged: 2019-06-12 19:55:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15347502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FrraFee/pseuds/thatiranianphantom
Summary: Doc won’t speak to her.It’s not like she blames him.But he communicates messages through Jeremy or Dolls and he doesn’t even look at her and she’s pretty sure he used to love her.Maybe Dolls did one day too.She destroyed both of them, and it’s been 8 months.When are things going to be normal again?in which our intrepid scooby gang is fracturing, so we call in the OGs





	1. Chapter 1

_Lead her to a place where she’ll be safe_

 

It’s a Wednesday

 

She knows, because it’s two for one beer night at Bert’s Bar.

 

(Too many alliterations, she knows, Bert always did think he was much smarter than he actually was.)

 

And that’s why she wasn’t home. Because Wednesday’s are two for one beer nights.

 

And she wouldn’t miss that, because the hot guys flock there.

 

They flock there, because only desperate girls go to bars to pick up men on Wednesday at 7pm.

 

Well, she fits the bill.

 

 

_I don’t think that I can handle this right now_

 

 

 

So she finds a random hot dude and they fuck, and don’t look at her like that, she doesn’t owe anyone shit.

 

And it does the trick, because she forgets.

 

For just that one moment, but it’s enough.

 

And she has to, _needs_ to forget. Any means necessary.

 

Because otherwise her mind remembers soft skin and feathery hair and her father’s eyes and that….that she _couldn’t_ think of, because she’ll never have that again.

 

It’s not hers to miss. It’s not hers to want. It never was.

 

 

_I guess the world didn’t stop_

_For my broken heart_

 

 

 

So. Wednesday night two for one beers.

 

The guy is blonde this time.

 

She’s trying to break from routine.

 

His name is Bill, or Bob, or some other shit with a B.

 

Doesn’t really matter, he has one job, and he doesn’t need a name for that.

 

Make her forget.

 

Forget Bulshar, forget Waverly and her questionable parentage, forget Mama, forget Doc, forget…her.

 

 

_I never dreamed when I was letting you go_

_That I would wake up and miss you this much_

 

 

 

Doc won’t speak to her.

 

It’s not like she blames him.

 

But he communicates messages through Jeremy or Dolls and he doesn’t even look at her and she’s pretty sure he used to love her.

 

Maybe Dolls did one day too.

 

She destroyed both of them, and it’s been 8 months.

 

When are things going to be normal again?

 

 

_If I took it all out on you_

_I never meant to_

 

 

She and Nicole drink together some days, when her baby sister isn’t curled into Haught’s lap.

 

Nicole doesn’t judge, she’s learned. She doesn’t ask questions.

 

She can’t handle questions.

 

She can’t talk about it.

 

She won’t.

 

So she talks about fucking hot dudes and drinks and Waverly looks at her with an amount of pity that she _hates_ , and Nicole just listens.

 

 

_Time makes you bolder, children get older_

_And I’m getting older too_

 

 

 

Doc finds a grey hair and “frets” for two hours.

 

He shaves his mustache minutes later and Jeremy stares for a full minute before running from the room.

 

She giggles.

 

That’s as close to a laugh as she gets these days.

 

 

Maybe it was wrong to take it as a sign of improvement but she does.

 

And it works, until that night, when she looks at the door of Shorty’s, and she remembers again.

 

That night, the dude is a redhead, because she doesn’t fucking care.

 

It’s been eight months, and the hole inside her is still there, and apparently, there is not enough empty sex and alcohol to fill it.

 

And that’s odd, because it always has been in the past.

 

Come on, when has Wynonna Earp _not_ been empty?

 

“Whiskey soaked and reckless”, Waverly had said.

 

Her entire life had been meaningless sex and alcohol.

 

So why was it suddenly not enough?

 

When did tiny fingernails and soft skin fuck her up so thoroughly?

 

 

_I will try to fix you_

 

 

She wants to feel _normal._

She wants it to be like it was.

 

She doesn’t understand. It’s been 8 months, but it’s like it was yesterday.

 

And she’s tried. She’s removed everything that would remind her.

 

Except for the picture, and she doesn’t look at that, but she can’t throw it out.

 

_It's quiet uptown_

_I never liked the quiet before_

 

 

So she’s not normal, but she’s _fine._ She’s coping.

 

Like she said, this is the way it’s always been, so she _really_ doesn’t understand all the pitying looks.

 

Waverly curls into bed with her sometimes, she feels it when she’s at the fringes of sleep. Never too deep.

 

But she sleeps. She trains. She eats. She’s fine.

 

 

_It’s too quiet in my town_

 

 

Dolls tries, sometimes.

 

She’ll hear him say “Earp” sometimes in that…tone, and she shuts that shit down as fast as she can.

  
She catches Jeremy taking a baby care book Waverly must have forgotten about off the shelf one day, and he babbles about how “it wasn’t for you….I mean, not about _your_ ….not that it wouldn’t….I mean, do any of us….you look _great_ , Wynonna, seriously, I mean, your body is…,” before she shuts him down.

 

And Waverly, she tries. She tries all the time.

 

So Wynonna avoids her. Avoids her sister, pushes her at Nicole, because she’s _fine_ and it’s _over_.

 

 

_I was fighting but I just feel too tired to be fighting_

_Guess I’m not the fighting kind_

 

 

 

Revenants keep coming. She keeps killing them, and keeps track meticulously on the back of the picture.

 

Gently, so as never to mar her face.

 

She never allows herself to second-guess it, because then there’d be thoughts about _what’s the point_ and _even if all the rev-heads are gone, she still wouldn’t be with you_.

 

But she kills them, she destroys them with a ferocity that wasn’t there before.

 

And they’re simple. Stupid. She can handle that.

 

And then, one day, one doesn’t burn. She shoots him twice, but he doesn’t burn.

 

And he gets dangerously close to her, and his teeth are fanged, and he goes to bite, and in that moment Wynonna….doesn’t care.

 

Let him take her. It would be over. Another heir would be called, and she’d be safe.

 

For that brief moment, she’s so lost in her thoughts that it’s a shock to feel the solid body on top of her turn to dust.

 

 _That_ was new.

 

 

_You’re always preaching not to be numb_

_When that’s how you thrive_

 

 

A hand pulls her up, and she reflexively lashes a punch out.

 

“Ow! Wow, new way of saying thanks!”

 

It’s a blond girl, and in her hand she holds a wooden stake.

 

Again, new.

 

“Sorry, Blondie. Thanks. I got it from here, my territory. You can go.”

 

She shakes her head. “Sorry. Vamp. Stake. That’s the universal Buffy-call. It’s a Slayer thing.”

 

(She’s not even surprised. Nothing surprises her anymore.)

 

 

 _For ever if I'm far away_ __  
I hold you in my heart  
I sing a secret song to you  
Each night we are apart

 


	2. we're forcing what is wrong

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Scooby Gangs OG and new meet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'M BACK BABYDOLL.
> 
>  
> 
> .......with the boring exposition chapter. Expositioning all over the place. Yeah. Enjoy.

It’s really cold in Canada. Like, unnaturally cold. And this girl is wearing a leather coat and the tightest jeans Buffy has ever seen.

 

Really, pretty much everything about this fell into the mega-weird category. She had taken a field trip with Spike and Giles (not common, sure, but not the weirdest thing that had every happened), and ended up tracking a vamp into this tiny town in Nowhere, Canada.

 

(Outside of Calgary, Giles corrects her.)

* * *

  
  


It takes them two days to find the former Nick Gelfuss, and when they do, he’s got his teeth inches from the neck of a girl. 

 

Buffy only briefly takes note of her expression, and only because that is not the typical gonna-get-eaten face. 

 

She almost looks…relieved. 

 

So she saves the girl and is almost instantly rewarded with a bitterly foul attitude. She’s done better for gratitude.

 

The girl is Wynonna, she finds out. Pretty and tall, with a hair care routine that she needs to find out, the girl carries a heaviness in her posture that Buffy hasn’t found on many.

 

Wynonna, she learns, calls herself the Heir. Capital H. She seems completely unharmed, if a little pissed off. She gets up, brushes herself off, curses the “rev-head” that got away. Buffy scrutinizes her up and down. She appear to be alone, she’s tiny and strong, and Buffy really, really strongly smells alcohol on her breath. 

 

She spends a good seven minutes explaining “vampire slayer”, but honestly, Wynonna doesn’t seem to care. 

 

“So you’re here to kill the bad guys that frequent here. How very novel. Hate to disappoint you, Blondie, but that’s one of the few things I actually can do.”

 

Look, here’s the thing. Buffy would never refuse help. She  _ had  _ help, on a basis approaching regular. But stealing her gig? No, that wasn’t something she was likely to accept. 

 

So she insists on staying, and Wynonna seems, yet again, somewhat less than grateful for the help. 

* * *

 

Buffy asks no less than twenty times what Wynonna does, and she offhandedly mentions something about something called revenants, and hey, Buffy’s a pretty open-minded gal, but that’s a new one.

 

Still, her heart skips at the possibility of a less-crazy-than-Faith fellow slayer, even when Wynonna mentions that Buffy and the rapidly approaching Giles and Spike had “scared off the other assholes.” 

 

(The language is something Buffy notices too.) 

 

That’s the first vampire they stake that night, but not the last. Admittedly, Buffy didn’t have time to learn his life story in all the dustiness. All she knows is his name started with an A. Eh, she’s gone off less info before. 

 

They kill another one in quick succession, and it’s both admirable and frightening how Wynonna beats on them. Her skill is amazing, just as good as Buffy’s, but there is an undercurrent to it, one of just...anger. 

 

Whether or not that’s from the booze Buffy can smell leaking from every pore or not, she beats on the vamp (name started with an L, don’t ask her why she remembered, but Wynonna seemed to have a passing familiarity with him) with a conviction Buffy can only call religious. She shares glances with Giles and Spike, but nobody says anything.

 

* * *

  
  


Wynonna takes Buffy, Giles and Spike home (again, reluctantly), and as it seems, they have their own Scooby Gang. She lives on a little farmhouse out of town, and before they even get in, Buffy can hear chatter from inside. 

 

The door opens and a brown haired girl eagerly greets Wynonna with a voracious hug, something she accepts but doesn’t reciprocate. 

 

The girl notices them and gives Wynonna an inquisitive look.

 

“Brought dinner guests home.” Wynonna swings her hand to indicate them. “They say something about being a vampire slayer. Girl says her name is Buffy. Inclined to believe her, if only because usually people who lie choose a more convincing name. Also told me the other names, but I can’t remember.”

 

Their host swings into the house and goes straight for the fridge, pulling out a beer. Meanwhile, the younger girl introduces herself as Waverly and lets them in. It’s just around dinnertime and Buffy’s stomach is rumbling. Waverly instantly sits them down and sets a plate of food in front of them. Buffy sits across from a young man and a redheaded woman, who are in the middle of a significantly-sized folder, and who protest loudly when Wynonna reaches over and closes it. 

 

“No nerd work at dinner, Chetri,” she drawls. “Tell him, Haughtpants.” 

 

The redhead sighs and extends her hand to them. 

 

“Nicole Haught. Nice to meet you.” 

 

(She seems fairly normal, something that seems increasingly rare around this house). 

 

She nearly startles out of her skin when she turns around to a shadowy figure in the doorway. 

 

Waverly sighs. 

 

“We tell you every day, Doc. You can actually enter the house for dinner.” 

 

The man looks older, with an old-fashioned mustache and a cowboy hat, and an expression not unlike Wynonna’s, drunken sadness. Was that just a general thing in Canada? 

 

“And like I’ve been tellin’ you every day, Officer Haught, I am not plannin’ on it.” 

 

( _ vampire?  _ Buffy’s mind asks)

 

Nicole, who at this point, just looked exasperated with everyone, mutters an  _ okay _ and moves back to the kitchen. 

* * *

 

After half an hour in the house, Buffy has managed to round up some information:

  * “Chetri”’s name is Jeremy, he appears to also live here with his boyfriend Robin
  * Wynonna’s sister Waverly reminds her so distinctly of Willow as she eagerly makes Buffy a full meal, bubbling questions a mile a minute until her girlfriend gently lays a hand on her arm. 
  * Wynonna has had three beers since they got home. 



 

They agree to let her stay with them, at least for now. They seem to deem her vampire expertise valuable, with what they describe as a vampire “infestation”. 

 

“Do they follow you, Blondie?” Wynonna snarks from the corner. 

* * *

 

They agree that Waverly and Giles will do some research tomorrow to come up with a long term game plan, and Waverly makes up the spare room for them. 

 

The night ends like Buffy imagines most do, based on the deft, practiced movements of all those around her. Wynonna passes out on the couch as Waverly brushes her hair back and pulls a blanket over her, setting a bucket down beside her. 

 

Nicole tries again to persuade Doc to come in to no avail as he glowers in the corner, eyes trained on Wynonna. 

 

And as she settles in, her mind runs over the vampires from today, and the odd group she was now a part of. Sadness permeated the group, and not the regular this-is-my-calling sadness. 

 

What had happened to them? 

 

Spike snores beside her as Buffy slowly fell into sleep, wondering. 

  
  
  



End file.
